#OccupyDameStreet March + Billy Bragg secret solidarity gig

Billy bragg will be marching with Occupy dame street from garden of remembrance at 2pm saturday. After he'll be perform at a secret location, come to the march to find out!!
Or for those that cant make it, watch online via the livestream at http://www.livestream.com/OccupyDameStreet
Billy was on newstalk radio today and mentioned his support for occupy dame street.... :-)

Hundreds people marched supporting #OccupyDameStreet and Real
Democracy Now! Ireland from the Garden of Remembrance to the site of the
ongoing occupation at the Central Bank plaza on Dame street on Saturday
15th October. At the open assembly after the march a large crowd agreed
vociferously that they wanted to march the same route again on Saturday
22nd October.

We will again gather at 2pm at the Garden of
Remembrance on 22nd October and march to the site of the Dame Street
occupation before moving to a location suitable for a large open
assembly.

We call on supporters of #OccupyDameStreet to spread
the word about this widely. The media will not do it for us. Let’s
become our own media and grow this movement. We are the 99%. We have the
power. We need to exercise it. – No drink, no drugs, no party political banners or flags and no violence – will also apply to this demonstration.

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Billy Bragg has always had a presence as an activist as much as
he has as a singer-songwriter in his career. Although he has written a
lot of love songs he has often had a political message to put across as
well. Now he’s back with another message – and he’s fighting.

On Kanye West at the Occupy Wall Street protest and the protests in London…

How fucking great is that? I’m very pleased about him being there.
You know who needs to be there in London? I’ll tell you who needs to get
his arse down there – a 20-year-old Billy Bragg. And he should come
with two messages “This is what’s happening” and “Fuck off old man back
to Dorset”. That’s what they need at that protest – they don’t need me
now coming down and telling them the way it is. I’ve written some stuff
about Occupy on my website, having been involved in that I feel I’ve got
something to contribute but they don’t need me on the barricade with
them – they’re making the world a new. I hope they’re listening to some
of my music if it inspires them then great – No Power Without
Accountability – it’s the same agenda that I’ve been writing about but
for me to rush down there isn’t needed. Someone like Ed Sheeran needs to
go down there, he needs to say, “This is my generation – this is my
fight”, Frank Turner – he needs to go down there. Not me. I’m not saying
I won’t go – but they don’t need me down there.

A final word on politics and music…

You can’t make political music in a vacuum but that excuse died with
the student riots – we’re not in a vacuum any more. Your generation is
not in a vacuum. You are in danger of becoming the first generation
since the war to grow up worse off than your parents so now it’s back to
fighting time and we need to hear some fighting songs.

A recent article on the WSWS website suggests that Billy Bragg has simply been a cover for the Labour Party and trade union bureaucracy in Britain for several decades and is part of a 'rightward lurch'.

The main criticism is the lack of demands and how this leaves the movement: 'leaves them at the mercy of the capitalist parties and in danger of ultimate failure.'

Here are some quotes from the article:

Bragg claims that there is a reaction against this financial juggernaut
within the official parties. The best he can come up with in regard to
the Labour Party, however, is to draw attention to party leader Ed
Miliband’s one-line attack on “predator” companies. He also cites US
President Barack Obama’s “lukewarm nod of recognition” to the Occupy
Wall Street demonstrators and even Conservative Chancellor George
Osborne’s announcement that “the government was going to take
responsibility for getting loans to small businesses.”

And it goes on to say:

Bragg here identifies the most significant shift in political
consciousness among broad masses, only to dismiss it as somehow lacking.
What he opposes is the development of politically conscious opposition
to capitalism. He wants popular sentiment to be dominated by the
single-issue protest politics of the middle class.

Bragg insists
the problem is not capitalism, but a “crisis in demand”—a classic
statement of Keynesian-style, national economic regulation that he
dresses up as the “need to put our economy on a different trajectory.”

In subsequent pargraphs this is further expanded and it is hard to know whether the writers are touchy about criticisms of Marxism or whether Bragg really is attemtpting to lead this movement off in the wrong direction.

He wants the Occupy movement to be channeled behind a nationalist
programme to defend British capitalism against its rivals. That is why
Bragg describes the movement as being opposed to the “globalisation
project”, as though the latter were a policy choice and not the
fundamental fact of modern economic life. In fact, the international
character of the anti-Wall Street protests reflects, if only in an
initial fashion, the striving of workers and young people to unite their
struggle against world capitalism.

Bragg is hostile to such a
development, which drives him to make an explicit attack on Marxism, the
only force capable of providing these objective spontaneous strivings
with a consciously worked-out revolutionary programme. He does so by
making a defamatory comparison between Marxists and the Tea Party
reactionaries in the US.

.....

Bragg denounces anyone who advocates “an instantly formulated set of
goals”, claiming this “reflects a desperate need for right wing news
outlets to have evidence that allows them to condemn those gathered in
opposition to the status quo.” In doing so, he infers that any attempt
to set out a clear socialist programme borders on the work of agent
provocateurs.

Perhaps it’s time to remind Mr. Bragg that 18
months ago he was encouraging workers and youth to vote Liberal
Democrat. Within a week of the election, the Liberal Democrats ditched
every promise they had made the electorate in order to join a grubby
coalition with the Tories and impose the most severe austerity measures
since the 1930s. The Socialist Equality Party, in contrast, fought to
politically warn the working class about what the ruling class was
planning.

The Internationale

Stand up, all victims of oppression,
For the tyrants fear your might!
Don't cling so hard to your possessions,
For you have nothing if you have no rights!
Let racist ignorance be ended,
For respect makes the empires fall!
Freedom is merely privilege extended,
Unless enjoyed by one and all.
So come brothers and sisters,
For the struggle carries on.
The Internationale,
Unites the world in song.
So comrades, come rally,
For this is the time and place!
The international ideal,
Unites the human race.

Let no one build walls to divide us,
Walls of hatred nor walls of stone.
Come greet the dawn and stand beside us,
We'll live together or we'll die alone.
In our world poisoned by exploitation,
Those who have taken, now they must give!
And end the vanity of nations,
We've but one Earth on which to live.
So come brothers and sisters,
For the struggle carries on.
The Internationale,
Unites the world in song.
So comrades, come rally,
For this is the time and place!
The international ideal,
Unites the human race.

And so begins the final drama,
In the streets and in the fields.
We stand unbowed before their armour,
We defy their guns and shields!
When we fight, provoked by their aggression,
Let us be inspired by life and love.
For though they offer us concessions,
Change will not come from above!
So come brothers and sisters,
For the struggle carries on.
The Internationale,
Unites the world in song.
So comrades, come rally,
For this is the time and place!
The Internationale,
Unites the human race.

Billy Bragg sings in the fancy Cork tent at #occupycork

Billy Bragg with the gang at #occupycork

Billy Bragg with the gang at #OccupyBelfast (hurl in hand)

Billy Bragg sings 'The Internationale' at the memorial to the International Brigades at Occupy Belfast